Provinciale Statenverkiezingen 2023

How do political campaigns target voters?

Methodology

In collaboration with Who Targets Me, we monitored over 900 Dutch political advertisers during the 2023 Provinciale Statenverkiezingen (Provincial elections) to better understand how campaigns use different targeting methods made available by Meta. To do this, we used data from the Meta Ad Library, using the new ‘Audience’ data which gives some detail on how pages target their ads.

To better understand the regional election, we kept only advertisers who:

  1. Advertised in the last 7 days (February 21st - February 27th 2023)
  2. Advertised in the last 30 days (January 29th - February 27th 2023)

Note: Meta only provides 7, 30 and 90 days windows for the targeting data in their Ad Library. Meta’s data also lags by a few days. We will update this report as soon as new data is available.

Topline Statistics

January 29th - February 27th 2023 (Last 30 days)

Number of Advertisers Top Spenders Number of Ads Total Spend

SP

8


1. SP (€34,471)
2. Lilian Marijnissen (€3,179)
3. SP Noord-Brabant (€170)

241

€38,389

PvdA

19


1. Partij van de Arbeid (PvdA) (€20,017)
2. PvdA Noord Holland (€3,227)
3. PvdA Limburg (€1,877)

258

€30,615

GroenLinks

5


1. GroenLinks (€17,135)
2. GroenLinks Brabant (€234)
3. GroenLinks Renkum (€100)

61

€17,669

VVD

21


1. VVD (€5,723)
2. VVD Flevoland (€2,200)
3. VVD Drenthe (€572)

147

€11,175

FvD

3


1. Forum voor Democratie -FVD (€7,049)
2. Wybren van Haga (€193)
3. Forum voor Democratie Zeeland (€100)

10

€7,342

Volt Nederland

1


1. Volt Nederland (€6,630)

208

€6,630

CDA

9


1. CDA (€5,372)
2. CDA Zeeland (€347)
3. CDA Drents Overijsselse Delta (€100)

44

€6,419

PVV

6


1. Geert Wilders (€3,294)
2. PVV Enschede (€196)
3. PVV Fryslan (€161)

29

€3,999

Ja21

1


1. Ja21 (€2,998)

198

€2,998

ChristenUnie

8


1. ChristenUnie Flevoland (€572)
2. ChristenUnie Noord-Holland (€544)
3. ChristenUnie Fryslân (€319)

100

€1,952

DENK

2


1. DENK (€1,634)
2. Mahmut Sungur DENK (€134)

342

€1,768

50PLUS

4


1. 50PLUSpartij (€984)
2. 50PLUS-Overijssel (€478)
3. 50plus Zuid-Holland (€100)

36

€1,662

PvdD

8


1. Partij voor de Dieren (€374)
2. Partij voor de Dieren Rijnland (€361)
3. Partij voor de Dieren Groningen (€283)

117

€1,617

BVNL

1


1. Belang van Nederland - BVNL (€1,085)

31

€1,085

D66

3


1. D66 (€800)
2. Wouter Versluijs (€100)
3. D66 Bloemendaal (€100)

65

€1,000

SGP

3


1. SGP provincie Gelderland (€593)
2. SGP Tholen (€100)
3. SGP Zeeland (€100)

17

€793

Alliantie

2


1. Henriette van Hedel - Alliantie (€584)
2. Alliantie (€100)

14

€684

February 21st - February 27th 2023 (Last 7 days)

Number of Advertisers Top Spenders Number of Ads Total Spend

GroenLinks

3


1. GroenLinks (€15,916)
2. GroenLinks Brabant (€234)
3. GroenLinks Limburg (€100)

56

€16,250

SP

4


1. SP (€14,022)
2. Lilian Marijnissen (€741)
3. SP Amsterdam (€100)

128

€14,963

Volt Nederland

1


1. Volt Nederland (€6,630)

208

€6,630

PvdA

13


1. PvdA Zuid-Holland (€1,544)
2. PvdA Limburg (€1,130)
3. Partij van de Arbeid (PvdA) (€867)

117

€5,755

VVD

15


1. VVD (€1,627)
2. VVD Flevoland (€498)
3. VVD Drenthe (€182)

90

€3,540

PVV

6


1. Geert Wilders (€1,371)
2. PVV Hengelo (€100)
3. PVV Den Bosch (€100)

22

€1,871

Ja21

1


1. Ja21 (€1,651)

79

€1,651

ChristenUnie

8


1. ChristenUnie Flevoland (€530)
2. ChristenUnie Noord-Holland (€354)
3. ChristenUnie Fryslân (€239)

92

€1,640

CDA

5


1. CDA (€386)
2. CDA Zeeland (€283)
3. CDA Drents Overijsselse Delta (€100)

23

€969

PvdD

7


1. Partij voor de Dieren Rijnland (€279)
2. Partij voor de Dieren (€100)
3. Partij voor de Dieren Groningen (€100)

107

€879

BVNL

1


1. Belang van Nederland - BVNL (€860)

29

€860

50PLUS

4


1. 50PLUSpartij (€498)
2. 50PLUS-Overijssel (€126)
3. 50plus Zuid-Holland (€100)

21

€824

DENK

2


1. DENK (€490)
2. Mahmut Sungur DENK (€125)

282

€615

Alliantie

1


1. Henriette van Hedel - Alliantie (€584)

11

€584

SGP

3


1. SGP provincie Gelderland (€370)
2. SGP Tholen (€100)
3. SGP Zeeland (€100)

16

€570

FvD

2


1. Wybren van Haga (€155)
2. Forum voor Democratie Zeeland (€100)

3

€255

D66

2


1. D66 (€104)
2. Wouter Versluijs (€100)

36

€204

Spending per Targeting Criteria

How much did campaigns spend on different targeting methods?

January 29th - February 27th 2023 (Last 30 days)

February 21st - February 27th 2023 (Last 7 days)

Top Targeted Audiences

Here, we show the top targeted audiences for each party (ranked by amount of Euro spend). Most (but not all) of these audiences are “interest” audiences, i.e. the parties targeted people interested in “Books” or “Politics”.

January 29th - February 27th 2023 (Last 30 days)

February 21st - February 27th 2023 (Last 7 days)

Top Contested Audiences

Here, we show the top most contested audiences, i.e. where all parties have spent considerable amounts of money competing to reach voters with the same interests. Most (but not all) of these audiences are “interest” audiences, i.e. the parties targeted people interested in “Books” or “Politics”.

January 29th - February 27th 2023 (Last 30 days)

February 21st - February 27th 2023 (Last 7 days)

Age Targeting

January 29th - February 27th 2023 (Last 30 days)

February 21st - February 27th 2023 (Last 7 days)

Gender Targeting

January 29th - February 27th 2023 (Last 30 days)

February 21st - February 27th 2023 (Last 7 days)

Education Targeting

January 29th - February 27th 2023 (Last 30 days)

February 21st - February 27th 2023 (Last 7 days)

Job Targeting

January 29th - February 27th 2023 (Last 30 days)

February 21st - February 27th 2023 (Last 7 days)